Archbishopric of Magdeburg
The Archbishopric of Magdeburg was a Roman Catholic diocese based in Magdeburg in the centre of Saxony-Anhalt, Germany. It existed from 967 until 1648, although the last Catholic Archbishop died in 1552 and the archdiocese was ruled by Lutheran administrators afterwards. The establishment of the Archdiocese The Emperor Otto I the Great had conquered the Slavs as far as the Oder in two wars in 940 and 954. In 955 he set to work about establishing a new archdiocese for these territories in Magdeburg by transferring the capital of the Bishopric of Halberstadt to Magdeburg and having it raised to an archdiocese. The Archbishop of Mainz, to whom the Bishop of Halberstadt was suffragan, greatly opposed the plan. In 962 Pope John XII gave his support to the establishment of an archdiocese in the region but by then Otto abandoned plans for a transfer. The Synod of Ravenna established the archdiocese in the presence of Pope and Emperor. Adalbert, a former monk at the Abbey of St Maximin in Trier and later Abbot of Weissenburg, was elected first archbishop in the Autumn of 968. Otto I granted several lands and privileges to the new archdiocese. The Archbishopric of Magdeburg (967 - 1648) The diocese of Magdeburg itself was very small, containing a few Slavic districts and the northern part of Thuringia. The suffragans of the archdiocese were the existing bishoprics of Brandenburg and Havelberg, and the newly established Meissen, Merseburg and Zeitz. Later suffragans were the Bishoprics of Poznań (until the 12th Century), Lebus and, for a time, Cammin. Adalbert established the cathedral school at Magdeburg as one of the most significant in Germany. After Adalbert's death in 981, Othrich (considered one of the most learned men of the time) was elected to succeed him but Gisilher of Merseburg obtained the see through bribery. Among the succeeding bishops, Gero (1012 - 1023), Werner of Steutzlingen (1064 - 1078) and St Norbert of Xanten (1126 - 1134; founder of the Premonstratensian Order) were the most important. Archbishop Wichmann of Seeburg (1152 - 1192) was more a prince than a churchman. He was a loyal supporter of the Emperor Frederick I Barbarossa and a skilled general who was active in the northeast of the Empire against the Emperor's enemies, especially Duke Henry III the Lion of Saxony. Albert I of Käfernburg (1205 - 1232) quarelled with the Emperor Otto IV of Brunswick and brought great ruin to the see in the ensuing warfare. In 1208 he began the construction of Magdeburg cathedral, which was never entirely finished. Günther I of Schwarzenberg (1277 - 1279) barely managed to avoid war with the Margrave of Brandenburg, furious that his brother Eric was not elected archbishop. Günther's successor Bernhard of Wolpe (1279 - 1282) was resign the archdiocese when the Margrave invaded and set Eric up as archbishop (1283 - 1295). Archbishop Albert III of Brandenburg (1513 - 1545) fostered the resentment which lead to the Reformation. He took a loan from Jacob Fugger to be elected Archbishop of Mainz in 1514, and to pay back the loan increased the prevalence of the sale of indulgences. Although fiercely opposed to Martin Luther and the Reformation, he was crippled by a perpetual lack of money. He eventually sold religious liberty rights to the citizens of Magdeburg for 500,000 florins. Albert III was succeeded by the zealous Catholics John Albert of Brandenburg (1545 - [[1550) and Frederick IV of Brandenburg (1551 - 1552), both of which could do very little. The people and the canons of the see were now largely evangelical, and Magdeburg came to be ruled by a series of Protestant administrators from the Elector of Brandenburg's family. In 1631 during the Thirty Years' War, the administrator Christian William was captured by Imperial forces and sent to Vienna. Leopold William of Austria took up the administration of the see until 1638 when it was given to Augustus, son of the Saxon Elector John George I. In 1648 the Peace of Westphalia secularised the archdiocese as a Duchy and gave it to the Elector of Brandenburg. See also *List of Archbishops of Magdeburg Magdeburg Category:Diocese of Magdeburg